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I purchased a pair of 2tb Hitachi HDDs a few months ago from Microcenter, which is a short drive from where I live. They are probably these, but could be these or even these. At only $20 per TB, how could I lose?

I think they probably are in good shape. I did an extended test on each, with gsmartcontrol, and each drive completed the test without error. All other tests I have run on them have shown no errors. However, when I start my PC from shutdown, sometimes Windows starts to run checkdisk - which it never did prior to installing these drives. I always skip the checkdisk, since I know it will take hours and I have no patience for it.

I use both of these drives for Windows Storage Space feature, and a few weird things have happened. One time I was getting an error message whenever I tried to copy a file to my redundant (mirrored) storage space, and when I investigated, I found Windows thought one of these HDDs was unplugged. I rebooted and the problem went away. Another time I was unable to open files stored in my simple (striped) storage space, for reasons I could not discover. Again, I rebooted and everything worked. To further confuse things, I once also got a very similar error ("unable to locate file" or something like that) on my Western Digital HDD, which I purchased new when I built my PC (~2 years ago), and has otherwise given me no trouble.

In all cases, rebooting fixed the issues, and no diagnostic program I have run has found errors. The main thing I have to counter these problems is to shut my PC down more often, vs. putting it to sleep. My PC used to go days or weeks without a shutdown or restart, only get put to sleep when not in use. It gets shut down daily now, and the weird errors have not repeated.

One thing that only occurred to me today, has to do with the tool-less mounts that the drives are in [my computer case is an Antec One budget gaming case]. I read internet posters complaining that drives mounted in tool-less mount tend to be noisier than one's screwed into mounts. Which led me to wonder if there was a way I could safely secure the HDD's in my case, such that they vibrate less, and are less noisy - without insulating them and causing them to overheat?

Any chance that making them vibrate less, would stop Windows prompting me to checkdisk on startup?

Any other suggestions regarding how to make sure my HDD's are working properly?

However, when I start my PC from shutdown, sometimes Windows starts to run checkdisk - which it never did prior to installing these drives. I always skip the checkdisk, since I know it will take hours and I have no patience for it.

Any chance that making them vibrate less, would stop Windows prompting me to checkdisk on startup?

The chkdsk initiatation on startup...indicates a file/file system problem with the partition on which the auto chkdsk tries to run. The system has detected a problem and is trying to overcome it...you should never skip the auto chkdsk, since so doing does nothing constructive about the problem. In fact, running the auto chkdsk may not even address the problem adequately, since it is a less robust version of the chkdsk command.

I find that running the chkdsk /r command on the partition named in the auto chkdsk, after the system has booted/settled...is the best course of action to pursue.

I find that running the chkdsk /r command on the partition named in the auto chkdsk, after the system has booted/settled...is the best course of action to pursue.

Louis

I skip the chkdsk at startup because I would expect it to take hours for a 2TB drive, and I have things to do. Most of the time it starts up without attempting a chkdsk. Once Windows is up and running, I do not know how to run chkdsk on individual drives, because they are used for Storage Spaces, and are not assigned drive letters.

Media (F:), Local content (H:) and Storage space (G:) are all storage spaces contained on the 2 refurbished drives I purchased. That is why I used gsmartcontrol to test them instead of chkdsk.

Today I will stop by Hobby Lobby and see what I can find to try to make my tool-less mounted HDD's vibrate less. I am going to bring along some of the extra sliding brackets that came with my case.

GSmart Control is a hard drive diagnostic...chkdsk /r is a file system tool within any version of Windows. They are not the same, don't come close to looking at the same things or doing the same actions.

Chkdsk can only run on one partition at a time...if you have multiple partitions on a hard drive, you can initiate chkdsk /r only 1 at a time.

GSmart does care about partitions, doesn't even care if there are any partitions on the selected hard drive. Regardless of drive size, it checks for functionality of the hard drive.

Every partition...every hard drive...reflected/used in Windows...must have a drive letter assigned.